Most unsuitable saloon racing cars

Recently I heard that Adrian Hamilton tried to race a Mercedes 600 back in 1970 or 1971! He entered that car, probably in more or less standard specification in a race in Thruxton, with predictable results - tyre problems forced him to retire early (that beast had 3 tons - was it the heaviest racing car ever?) Anyone has a picture?
Also, I would like to know more about cars that looked unsuitable for racing but were raced anyway. Isettas entered for Mille Miglia come to mind first, then Lanfranchi Moskviches that even proved successful because of strange rules... Audi 200 Avant Quattros in rallying, Volvo station wagons in BTCC...
More favorites?

Bob Jane also entered a Grosser Mercedes for the Bathurst endurance event, a 500-miler in those days. But Bob more than once entered a car like this and failed to turn up... I believe he had the car at the time, however.

This race has been one to turn out a lot of cars that weren't really all that suitable... Vauxhall Vivas, would you believe, swamped the little-car class in 1963 and beat everything home!

To see a Valiant V8 on the mountain on standard wheels and tyres... Ugly!

Didn't someone rally a Rolls-Royce?This would have been in the late 1960s-early 1970s time frame when there was a fad of transcontinental rallies like the London to Sydney and the World Cup rallies.I can't recall the specific events the Rolls competed in or the name of the driver.I do remember that they had a hell of a time with the semi-trailing rear suspension links breaking due to cornering stress!

A Polonez with Leyland 1.4 engine (late 80's - begin 90's in the Netherlands group N championship).
There was this famous racing Mini stationcar in Britain.
A Rolls-Royce taking part in Paris-Dakar (early 80's)
In the ETC, sometimes roadcars took part (perhaps after receiving some Deutschmarks) just to fill the class otherwise there wouldn't have been points for the winner. I know of a Ford Taunus 20M TS which "competed" this way.
Volvo's 240 turbo was an unlikely racecar at first as well. In the German DTM championship, a 4-door version was raced. Someone took the liberty to add a "taxi" sign on the roof... When Volvo was winning, the laughing stopped.
The rallying Audi was a Quattro sedan, incidentally.
The Spa 24h once had a Peugeot 806 (IIRC) racing.
The Nürburgring 24 hour has a liberal format, so cars racing on LPG or even diesel can compete, as well as some stationcars and an Opel Zafira group A.

Originally posted by Mobetta Didn't someone rally a Rolls-Royce?This would have been in the late 1960s-early 1970s time frame when there was a fad of transcontinental rallies like the London to Sydney and the World Cup rallies.I can't recall the specific events the Rolls competed in or the name of the driver.I do remember that they had a hell of a time with the semi-trailing rear suspension links breaking due to cornering stress!

I think you're right, though I can't find an entry list. Moreover, Mrs Brown entered a 1927 Rolls in most (if not all) of the round Australia 'trials' of the fifties and sixties...

As for the Westminster, the only thing against it was weight, provided he had the big bore engine... and even then the weight would have been on a par with that of the Jaguars he was up against. Or less.

I always thought the Volvo 850 estate that ran in the BTCC in the first half of the 90's was amusing. Those two Cadillac sedan de Villes than were entered at Le Mans in 1950 must rank up there somewhere too

Some years ago in Germany we used to laught about the giant Audi quattro V8 when it came into the German touringcar championship - but no one laughed when that car at least won 2 championships with Hans Stuck jr. and Frank Biela...

The Rolls-Royce was a Silver Shadow entered in the 1970 World Cup Rally by Ray Richards. One of the co-drivers was Bill Bengry. (Car no. 52)

Also on that rally (car no. 13) was a Series 1 Silver Cloud

The Shadow made it to Mexico, but not as a finisher, as it was excluded on time somewhere in south America, , but it continued to Mexico as a sort of mobile support car for any competitor that needed it, especially in the Andes.

The Silver Cloud retired in Brazil after the crew apparently spent 23 hours searching for a lost wheel nut!!

Originally posted by bobbo A fellow named Jim Clark drove a Ford (US) Galaxie with a 7 litre engine at Crystal Palace around 1964 or so ! Apparently he didn't do too poorly, IIRC!

Bobbo

There were a few Galaxies in British racing at that time, Brian Muir ended the life of one (Willment's) and the aforementioned Jack Sears also drove one.... Dan Gurney started them on that trend when he took a 1962 Impala 2-door to England and led the Jags a merry chase.. that very car being brought to Australia later by Laurie O'Neil and becoming the tow car for Greg Cusack and his team.

Another was the car of Gawaine Baillie, who brought his car out here for the Sandown endurance race and let Lex Davison put the car perilously close to dropping into the dam. It also raced at Warwick Farm and Longford. A local Galaxie was also driven by Davison and Norm Beechey, and Beechey beat the Jane Jag once with another Impala.

So the big sedans weren't so out of place in the sixties at all.. they were competitive with the other stuff of the day, only being eclipsed when the Mustangs came out...

If you want really wierd... how about the Chrysler entries in the Spa 24-hours events of the fifties... side valve sixes in big sedans, Chrysler looking at attracting buyers among the Swiss populace apparently (where did I read about this? Paul Frere's book, I think)...

Originally posted by Michael Müller It was no AMG car, but a works project, in fact not the 4.5 ltr, but a 450 SLC 5.0.

Michael, I meant the AMG Mampe touring car for the ETC. That didn't have the 5-litre engine, it wasn't homologated at the start and the car received very little development after that.It wasn't bad either, even racing in 1980 occasionally. But an unlikely racing car anyway.

Bill Bengry's Silver Shadow in the 1970 World Cup Rally is strange enough - but even stranger, I would suggest, was Keith Schellenberg's entry in the 1974 World Cup event.

A 1930 Bentley 8-litre Tourer.

Like Bengry's Royce, it made the course, albeit excluded for being out of time. But in an event where there were only 6 finishers out of close to 100 entrants, I'd say that was pretty good going.

If I recall correctly, one of the biggest holdups encountered was having to wait for a crew member who had gone back to England to pick up more wire wheel spokes, because they kept shaking loose over the stage miles.

What is it that makes the Lancia Flaminia a unsuitable as a salon race car?

The nessesary technology was there: Alloy V6 (homologated for three dual Webers), transaxle, deDion rear suspension, disc brakes on all wheels (in the late '50s to early '60s), 50-50 weight distribution, etc.Surely it was a bit heavy straight from the production line, but that could be fixed (Zagato even built one or two tubular chassied Flaminias).

The main reason why the Flaminia was not a great success on the race track was that Lancia did not have a offical race department in the days of the Flaminia, it was built after Lancia had stoped raceing in the mid '50s and before HF Scuadra Corse had become a more organised racing dapartment for Lancia.

Originally posted by Criceto Bill Bengry's Silver Shadow in the 1970 World Cup Rally is strange enough - but even stranger, I would suggest, was Keith Schellenberg's entry in the 1974 World Cup event.

A 1930 Bentley 8-litre Tourer.

Like Bengry's Royce, it made the course, albeit excluded for being out of time. But in an event where there were only 6 finishers out of close to 100 entrants, I'd say that was pretty good going.

If I recall correctly, one of the biggest holdups encountered was having to wait for a crew member who had gone back to England to pick up more wire wheel spokes, because they kept shaking loose over the stage miles.

Schellenberg ran that car in a number of marathons, I'm sure, including the London-Sydney. Must have got used to carrying spare spokes...

A British hairdresser entered and completed (a special version of the Baja 1000 for y2k) in a Citreon 2cv. The driver had absolutely no business in the event, and the car even less, but he managed to get through it.

Originally posted by Joe in LA A British hairdresser entered and completed (a special version of the Baja 1000 for y2k) in a Citreon 2cv. The driver had absolutely no business in the event, and the car even less, but he managed to get through it.

Both cylinders beating furiously...

Is that as bad as this thing (or three of its brothers...) that competed in the 1964 Ampol Round Australia Trial... entered by the manufacturer, who really should have stuck to making washing machines!

This one had two cylinders too, I think, made by Villiers (you know, lawnmowers, pumps, etc) and bored right out to 354cc!

Among the FIA Group 1 homologations (5000 series-built) for 1972, I've found such wonderful racers as the Trabant, Humber Sceptre, Vauxhall Cresta and from "Diahatsu"[sic] something called a Fellow Max L38, which weighed in at a magnificent 356cc.

And in group 2 (1000 series-built), it would have been possible to race an Austin Mini Countryman - that's the estate version, complete with wooden trim! I wonder if anyone ever thought seriously about running an Otosan Anadol ... (I always thought that sounded more like a painkiller than a car!)

Sometimes cars which seem unsuitable seem to be quite successful. The Volvo 240T, which had the aerodynamics of a brick, but brutally powerful, was quite successful, winning the 85 ETC, 86 ATCC and even some '87 ETC rounds.

The Volvo 850 sedan seemed big and not suited to Super Touring rules, yet managed to win many races.

How about the Jaguar XJ12C that British Leyland ran in the ETCC in 1976 & 77. Very powerful, but didn't handle, even in the hands of quality steerers like Andy Rouse and Tim Schenken.

Ray Bell or another one of our esteemed Aussie journos may have more knowledge on this - but as a kid of about 11 or so I remember seeing an article in either Wheels or Sports Car World about a 6.3 or 6.9 Mercedes being raced somewhere in Scandinavia - Finland from memory. I remember it had huge body roll, all sorts of wonderful wheel angles, and a sponsorship sign on the corner behind it which said something like YHDSPANKKI or some such act.

The Carrera Panamericana, especially in 1950 and in the stock car class, saw some really "interesting" machines show up. Few recall the Nash of this period (my uncle owned one), but it was not much of what I would call prime racer material -- yet, a Nash beat the Alfa Romeos and Lincolns on the final stage of the 1950 Carrera!

Originally posted by Steve Williams Ray Bell or another one of our esteemed Aussie journos may have more knowledge on this - but as a kid of about 11 or so I remember seeing an article in either Wheels or Sports Car World about a 6.3 or 6.9 Mercedes being raced somewhere in Scandinavia - Finland from memory. I remember it had huge body roll, all sorts of wonderful wheel angles, and a sponsorship sign on the corner behind it which said something like YHDSPANKKI or some such act.

The site gives some interesting details about the competition life of the 300 SEL 6.3.Unfortunately, the site mentioned above mixes up some dates. The works cars practised at Spa 1969 (but didn't race), the AMG car (there might have been two) raced in 1971-1972. There was officially no link between the two, the first AMG was built from a poad accident wreck.

Ray, thank you for picture of Zeta. I heard that Australian government issued some rules about designing and constructing vehicles to avoid unsafe and badly made vehicles like Zeta...
Tatra 603 was mildly successful race car - I know they ran in Nurburgring one year and had some good results but I should search for more details.
Trabants achieved a lot of class wins in European champioship rally events, as well as Wartburgs.
And a guy from Slovenia, Jani Trcek, rallied a Renault 4 around ten years ago - with predictable "success".
Frank, Audi indeed ralied both saloon and estate version of 200 - Croatian champion Tihomir filipovic drove one estate in European Championship events.
And, of course, historic events are full of unusual entrants. Paris to Peking race was won by a Jeep! His owner, Phil Surtees often rallies it in other UK historic events as well.
Around the world in 80 days race (surely the longest one ever - there was a thread about it) was won by a Hillman Hunter. An early Citroen 2CV was also in that race.

The Fiat Uno entered in the 1986 James Hardie 1000. Poor little thing was so outclassed by everything else... It managed to finish the race, but having completed 110 laps, it was one lap short of being classified.

Originally posted by William Dale Jr The Fiat Uno entered in the 1986 James Hardie 1000. Poor little thing was so outclassed by everything else... It managed to finish the race, but having completed 110 laps, it was one lap short of being classified.

There's a story about that, I think I may have posted it before...

Gordon Mitchell was the WA Street Car and Sports Sedan Champion racing for the same entrant, Frank Cecchele (sp?), co-driver was Allan McCarthy who was doing reasonably in the ex-Geoghegan Holden Monaro. The car was built by Frank, who prepared both cars for Gordon and had turned the turbocharged Rover engine into a super-reliable jet.

The got the car set up in Perth, dynoed it, then trucked it straight to Bathurst. It has plenty of grunt and handled well, stopped fine... but it had an annoying and debilitating problem in the ignition... it virtually shut down at any time at all... 135mph down the straight, going fine, then shut down... no apparent reason. They did have one problem, a CV joint failed, but other than that everything was rosy except for the electrical problem.

It was such a problem that they had a hard time getting onto the grid at all, not being able to put in a complete lap with power available, and they would naturally get in the way of others out practising because they never knew when it was about to drop its bundle.

At one stage, the all-knowing all-important 19yo Mark Skaife walked past loudly proclaiming that "amateurs like them shouldn't be allowed to enter the race."

Anyway, they tried to race, had the problem throughout, then packed it up and took it to Adelaide, where they had the same problem practising for the GP weekend supports.

Frank then had a brainwave. The only thing that had been changed after it was dynoed was the precautionary change from carbon plug leads to copper leads... he changed them back and the car was a flyer!

It seems the different resistance upset the management system and told it to shut down every so often...

So the car wasn't such a dud, it just had a minor problem that made it look that way.

I believe that the Fiat Uno still races in Western Australia, i have seen pics in Auto Action.

How about the Audi 5x5 that raced at Bathurst between 1982-1984, or the Maserati BiTurbo, i will never forget the footage of the car wobbling all over the place on the exit of woodcote at silverstone in 1987.

I was going to mention the Biturbo, but I always believed that had the cars been better built from their bare shells - their roll cages weren't even connected to the suspension mounting points! - the cars could at least have been competitive and handled better. I know Armin Hahne said that they had many problems with the engines, and that had hindered the development of the rest of the car, but still...

I remember the Uno at Bathurst it was doing good laps in practice, Out the pit exit onto Mountain straight struggle up the hill to the back gate and drive into the back of the pits into pitlane ready for another flyer! I think it was doing a lap (very short lap) in under 3 min

To Frank:There are some very misty rememberings to the Mampe SLC now as you mention it, however, no details remained. You have more, may be photo?

To Bobbo and Ray:The Galaxy was in no way unsuitable, even today the “smaller” version, the 5 ltr Ford Falcon, is a “must have” if you want to win in historic touring car racing.

To Steve and Frank:The 300 SEL 6.8 basically was rather unsuitable, but the brute power of the enlarged V8 compensated air suspension and weight.

Even in standard street version the 6.3 was a beast, which I remember with awe. Only available with a special automatic gearbox, as no manual MB transmission and no clutch was able to handle the gigantic torque, 0-100 kph at 6.8 sec - without real first gear, because on gearing the first was more a 2nd, and hunting 911’s on the Autobahn, which was special fun with a “250 S” fixed to the boot lid.

The engine was totally understressed, 250 DIN-HP resp. 280 bhp for 6300 cc with manual fuel injection was nothing. Top power was available already at 4000 rpm, and more than 5000 was not possible. Theoretically the M100 engine could be tuned rather easily, as there was plenty of potential, but in practice this was blocked by the injection pump. We had plans to drop the injection and convert it to 4 Weber carbs, which finally failed due to financial reasons. The figures I remember for the factory 6.8 increased constantly, with the Spa version around 425 DIN-HP, although rumours had been around up to 485. The later AMG version was somewhat tamer, lacking the full technical possibilities the factory had.

Anybody remembering the colour of the factory cars? The AMG was blood red, I still remember. One of the cars I saw at a hill climb in Germany in the eearly 70’s was silver. I also remember one which was black-yellow, but don’t remember whether it was genuine or not.

Since I sold my 6.3 end of 70’s I missed it, and I still miss it today. Since 20 years now I’m thinking to buy one again, always with ups and downs, and I’m nearly sure that the day will come where I cannot withhold anymore. And who knows, may be I’m crazy enough to convert it into a blood red AMG replica, with Webers of course, as even after 25 years I’m keen to know whether it works ...!

The Spa car seems to be identical with the Macao car, colour is dark (which one??), so neither silver or black-yellow which I remember.I prefer the AMG version, due to change of regulations now wide wheel arches had been allowed, which looks more brute with the fat tyres.Btw, Cock Wieman of Amsterdam 2 years ago prepared a 6.3 for cicuit racing in the Yountimer Trophy. However, he claims to be in the beginning of the project only having reached just 350 HP. Also air suspension has been removed in favour of mechanical springs.

As far I know there was only one AMG 6.8 which in fact has been sold to Matra for testing of aircraft tyres. So it seems the 1972 car was the updated first car.
I also remember the rallye cross car, as far as I remember it was a standard 6.3 only. Sad picture, only the last one is even sader!

If we're talking about unsuitable saloon cars - this story MUST be told. Not because the car was ugly, unsuitable or uncompetitive, but because it was built without reading the rules for what it was built. The French Maserati importeur Thepenier wanted to enter (at least a 2 car team), the 'last' Maserati at LeMans 1974 - but it never came to a start - they never even saw the Sarthe. Finally when the 'Competetion' Bora was ready they realized that it could not be homologated as the annual Bora production was less than 500 - and on top of everything, it's V8 engine was to big! A real UNSUITABLE car.

If they only have read the rules...

Still the car was told to be a 'muscle man' (around 450 hp), realtively lightweight and, as far as I can see, extremely good looking.